A homeowner’s claim that the government illegally took her home and then stole the profit from the sale was upheld in the Supreme Court

The Supreme Court agreed with a 94-year-old lady who claimed the government had violated her constitutional rights by seizing the proceeds from the sale of her home.

After a county in Minnesota withheld $25,000 in profits from the sale of Geraldine Tyler’s apartment during a tax foreclosure auction, Tyler brought the case to the state’s highest court.

Hennepin County seized Tyler’s house for $15,000 in back taxes and fees, but they sold it for $40,000 and kept the difference.

The court unanimously agreed that the county had broken the Fifth Amendment’s prohibition on expropriating private property without reasonable compensation.

Twelve US states frequently allow the government to retain extra revenues in similar instances, as the Pacific Legal Foundation, which championed Tyler’s lawsuit, reports.

According to the Foundation, this ruling is a massive victory for the property rights of ordinary Americans. This ruling upholds that property rights are constitutional and not subject to variation across individual states. As the Court has ruled, taking someone’s equity in their house is unfair and against the law and the Constitution.

The county’s losing position was that Tyler should have been able to sell the house on her own and had effectively abandoned it.

After moving into an elderly care facility in 2011, Tyler, who had bought the one-bedroom apartment in 1999, became behind on her property taxes.

Also Read: BitTorrent Bridge Brings Justin Sun’s TRX to Ethereum